“A business fellow,” observed Mr. Black, approvingly, “and worth such a lot of money; I wonder who will have it when he dies. Croft, likely as not. Is there not some scripture about people who have much, getting more?” Very heartily Arthur Dudley secretly anathematised this Croft, who seemed to be now, as he thought, for ever under his nose. Already he was beginning to have personal experience of the truth Mr. Raidsford had mentioned to Lord Kemms—namely, that people always meet again; that, let the circle in which they revolve be large or small, still they ultimately come back to the point whence they started, and are brought once more into contact with the men and the women they knew at that period in their career. If he please, a man may, like Arthur Dudley, curse the old ties, and strive to break away from them; but, like Arthur Dudley also, he will find after the years that there is no severance possible. Friends and acquaintances; those whom we once knew well; those whom we have merely met, crop up continually in our path. We come across them in unlikely places; we encounter them in strange houses; we are thrown against them under the most singular circumstances. We leave them, as we think, behind, and behold, we discover, when the years roll by, that they have been travelling also; that, during all the time which seemed to be increasing the distance between us, we have really been traversing gradually converging lines, which bring us, after the springs, and the summers, and the autumns, and the winters, face to face at last. Here, after years, for instance, was Squire Dudley brought into contact once again with the people he had known and dwelt among in his earlier manhood; here, also, he was going to breakfast with the bachelor of Scotch proclivities, who had so long ago influenced the name bestowed upon Heather at her baptism. Once more there was a likelihood of Mrs. Dudley reviving the associations of her childhood, and meeting with some of the members of her own kith and kin. The Bells of Layford—amongst whom figured prominently a Sir Wingrave Bell—had long been friends of Mr. Allan Stewart. Scottish people all, come southward, they hung together after the goodly manner of their country; and, very probably, had it not been for the unhappy quarrel which ended in utter alienation between the Rector of Layford, and his cousin and patron’s eldest friend and ally, Mr. Stewart would have done well for his god-child when she was left an orphan, and not relinquished her without a struggle into the hands of Mrs. Travers, who had proved herself, perhaps, a little unduly anxious to be rid of such a trust.